This invention relates to a container for retaining and displaying a plurality of individually packaged items.
There have been many types of containers adapted to hold and display a plurality of articles at the point of sale. One such device is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,768,639 which discloses a vacuum formed tray which is set within a box and which includes a plurality of identical recesses within which there is loosely received the articles to be displayed and sold. A siilar structure is shown in the U.S. Pat. No. 1,098,897 which includes a pasteboard member having cut out openings in the top thereof, with individual pockets suspended beneath each of the openings to loosely receive the article to be displayed.
Other types of prior art containers for articles are typically open boxes or trays for containing various articles such as those shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,263,819; 1,366,433; 1,996,965; 2,312,595; 2,902,200; 3,869,077 and 4,350,249.
As is well known, it is common to secure packaged articles upon cards which are then openly displayed at the point of sale and are arranged to permit the customer to remove the article from the display card. Such devices are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,402,635 and 1,940,078. A typical individual container for articles such as jewelry and well known to those in the art is for example shown in U.S. Pat. No. 3,788,123. U.S. Pat. No. 4,011,943 discloses a transporting container which includes a plurality of trays each in turn containing articles to be sold and arranged so the trays can be removed one at a time for display and sale, similar to an open box or tray containing the articles.
Though all of the prior art devices known and above generally described are effective, they do not provide the ability to easily contain and display a plurality of prepackaged items in a container which can be utilized to protect the prepackaged items other than during the time that they are to be displayed and sold and at the same time providing some security in that to remove an individual package from the container requires some force to separate it therefrom.
The present invention is particularly useful to receive and display for sale individual daily doses of food supplements such as vitamin tablets. Vitamins or groups of vitamins providing a daily dosage are not usually sold individually because of the packaging costs and time required to unpack the small articles. Typically, vitamins are sold in bottles containing a large number of an individual vitamin or alternatively where vitamins are packaged for daily dosages they are contained in a box or can requiring the purchaser to obtain large quantities thereof at one time.